I think I may have eaten a maggot or two today. More on that later.

I had to head into Kiev today for a medical appointment. I’d been having some pretty severe knee pains in the past couple of month and I finally broke down and talked to a doctor about it. I don’t know what stopped me for so long. I think I was afraid of something being seriously wrong. I’ve never had injuries except the time I fractured my nose. Why now? Why in Peace Corps? Would I have be sent home for a time to get some sort of surgery? I didn’t want to deal with it.

As it turns out, the doctor suspects I have Iliotibial Band Syndrome. From how he explained it, it’s fairly common and it will be best to just let my leg rest over the winter and that should do most of the healing for me. I’m also supposed to stretch it daily, apply mild heat to it, wear a knee brace when I’m going to put excessive stress on it and to take ibuprofen for a couple of weeks. I guess I can do that. I’m looking forward to spring when I can try it out again.

That took up most of my day and I’ve been exhausted still from yesterday. When I got home today, I wanted to eat and pass out but I made myself do a little writing. I fell a little behind of where I need to be and I have no intention of writing more today but tomorrow I plan to more than make up for it.

Today, as a part of my 30 Day Challenge, I had to increase my testosterone. I’m supposed to pick at least three things from the list and do them today and try to keep at them for the rest of the month. Here’s what I chose and what ultimately led me to the possibility of eating maggots:

• Get 8 hours of sleep tonight
• Eat a serving of animal protein
• Eat a serving of good fat

I’m not positive the fat on the pork I ate was good fat, but I ate it nonetheless. While I was preparing the dinner (stir fry), I started to add some spices (salt, pepper, etc.). I thought I’d add a little paprika which I inherited from another volunteer. As I’m pouring it, I notice it has some large chunks in it. I take a closer look at the chunks and decide that they’re actually larvae of some kind (I assume maggots). Some were moving. I did my best to scoop all of them out of my stir fry because I couldn’t just throw all that otherwise perfectly good food away. I may have missed a couple and that’s how I may have eaten maggots today.

So, not that I’ve gotten my protein from pork and maggots and me knee checked out, I’m going to watch a movie before I pass out for at least eight hours so I can have a full day of writing tomorrow.